KABUL, Afghanistan - The relief agency Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) said Wednesday it is pulling out of Afghanistan, discouraged about a fruitless investigation into the slayings of five of its workers and fearful of new attacks...

Taliban-led militants have been blamed for attacks that have killed more than 30 aid workers since March 2003 and made much of the south and east virtually off-limits. The killings of the MSF workers occurred in the northwest and raised fears that the violence was spreading was also becoming too dangerous.

I know it will make absolutely no difference in the U.S. presidential election this year because most people won't pay attention anyway, but elections in Afghanistan (which BushCo touts as a success) have been postponed twice now. Elections been rescheduled for October, but it's hard to see how they can be successful when the people doing the voter registration are being shot in the act of registering voters.

In earlier postings on ASZ, we've established that the only secure areas in Afghanistan are a 10 square mile area of Kabul and 15 feet to either side of any roadway that a military convoy or patrol is driving. The Taliban and poppy warlords are pretty much back in the driver's seat. We've no more than 10,000 troops in a country larger than Iraq. In other words, Afghanistan is an abject failure.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai should thank his lucky stars that Osama bin Missing is still on the lam - because there would be absolutely zero U.S. focus in Afghanistan otherwise.

Rather than try to dab more cologne on the pigs that BushCo has created, the Kerry campaign needs to become really active in spraying both situations with bullshit repellent. Yes, President Kerry is going to have a daunting task ahead of him when the Texan squatter's occupation of the White House ends this coming January. But it's a task that Kerry signed up for when he decided to run. We can hope he chooses to surround himself with more pragmatic and less ideologic brains than George Bush has managed to do in his four years at the helm.